(1) Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method of determining the amount of the substances or ions contained in an ionic solution or a non-deionized solution and a one side barrier-covered crystal oscillator used therefor, and more particularly to a method of determining in situ the amount of the substances or ions contained in an ionic solution or a non-deionized solution by use of a one side barrier-covered crystal oscillator.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
Determination of the amount of the substances or ions contained in an ionic solution or a non-deionized solution by use of the crystal oscillator has to be carried out by a process in which measurements of frequency of the crystal oscillator are effected in distilled water or deionized water separately from the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution, because the use of the crystal oscillator by dipping it into the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution as it is, causes substantially no oscillation, resulting in making substantially impossible the afore-mentioned determination, or making impossible accurate determination of the amount of the substances or ions contained in the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution, depending on the concentration of ions in the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution.
There have been proposed, for example, (1) a method of determining the amount of substances contained in the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution, which comprises setting a crystal oscillator in a flow cell, allowing distilled water to flow therethrough, allowing the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution to flow therethrough for adsorbing the substances contained therein onto the crystal oscillator, and allowing distilled water to flow therethrough for measuring the frequency of the crystal oscillator as used in the studies of the antigen-antibody reaction; (2) a method of determining the amount of ions contained in the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution, which comprises holding a crystal oscillator between two cells, filling one of the cells with the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution and the other with distilled water so that the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution and the distilled water may be brought into contact with each of the both electrodes of the crystal oscillator respectively, and measuring the frequency of the crystal oscillator as employed in the determination of the amount of the heavy metal ion; and (3) a method of determining the amount of ions contained in the ionic solution, which comprises setting horizontally the crystal oscillator, mounting a case on the upper side only of the crystal oscillator, filling the case with the ionic solution or the non-deionized solution, and measuring the frequency of the crystal oscillator as employed in the determination of the heavy metal ion.
Of these prior art methods, the first method (1) needs a large amount of ionic solution or non-deionized solution in the flow system and is disadvantageous when the adsorption and desorption take place reversibly, the second method (2) is based on the fact that the crystal oscillator is insensitive to the weight on a crystal plate part other than the electrode part, in other words, the fact that the crystal plate part other than the electrode part does not participate in oscillation, but raises problems of strength as the size of the cell is increased, because the crystal oscillator is formed by use of a thin crystal plate, and the third method (3) is based on the fact that the crystal oscillator is insensitive to the weight on the crystal plate part other than the electrode part as in the second method (2), but has such drawbacks as to make temperature control difficult and make stirring impossible.